My twisted, shattered mind
by Tris PhantomEvans
Summary: Since Kid came back from his mission at Brennenburg, he was never the same again.


**Hello world! So this is the story I mentionned in my other story that I have written! A warning though: there is some gore and a bit of swearing but trust me, there is A LOT of gore so beware! I got inspired in just a few seconds, thinking about sentences and descriptions and I was like "Stop thinking about it and START WRTING IT DOWN.". And I did. I also added a bit of Divergent in it but only those who read will get where I put in X) I hope you all like it, leave a review to tell me your opinions on the story or a Favorite if you just adored it.**

**Disclaimer: If I owned Soul Eater, Divergent or Amnesia The Dark Descent, I would probably a serial killer and would have killed you all. But I ain't.**

**The show must go on so I present my latest story, My twisted, shattered mind! *bows at the public* Here we go!**

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Death the Kid finally came back from his lone mission.

Everyone in his circle of friends had waited, terribly worried, for weeks before being able to see his face again and they were more than happy when it happened, mostly Liz and Patty. Since he was obliged to go to Brennenburg, in Prussia, alone, an order from Lord Death as he said it was too dangerous to bring living weapons without risking their lives, the two guns reluctantly stayed at Death City. As a replacement for the two weapons, Lord Death gave Kid different twin guns – soulless, that could too shoot his wavelength and kill Kishin eggs, though he can't resonate with them. They all wandered what could happen to be so dangerous that Kid couldn't bring his real weapons and that frightened Liz,, not only because of the creatures she imagined lurking in the shadows but also for his life, as she implored with the others all month since his departure that he would return safe and sound. BlackStar mostly thought that his stripped friend would return within a day or day, as he always do and he bragged that he would challenge him into another fight again, to Tsubaki's exasperation. He whined as for the why he couldn't take the mission instead of Kid, saying that he was better than Kid and that he could complete it within a few hours. As a result, he received a Maka Chop from said meister, her saying that it was lunch, that they were eating and that he was getting into her nerves after full days of his yammering, two days after Kid left and that she could attack him with a book _and _food. Though, no one knew except Tsubaki, he was saying all this because to do something, anything that could reassure him that Kid was okay, even if he knew that Kid is a Grim Reaper and that he would all mostly come back without a scratch. It was just a bad feeling he had felt, that he had continuously shook off himself. Crona and Liz had become more and more paranoid as days past without any news of Kid, he didn't even called his father, which made them even more anxious. Patty mostly shrugged and laughed it off, telling the two in a failed attempt of comforting that Kid was practically invincible with his Reaper powers and that no one had never beaten Death himself, that he was probably having right at the moment a symmetry fit, which didn't really help.

"B-but, how could y-you know if Kid isn't d-dead?" had asked Crona when Patty said that, as the three of them were sit in the luxurious living room of Gallows Manor, "T-there are plenty of p-people l-like me, m-murderers…"

"I just know and you're not a murderer, Crona." had nearly shouted with confidence, "He'll come back, I'm sure of it!"

When two weeks had past, everyone was eating their nails, desperate to hear something from Kid, the atmosphere around them gloomy and depressed. Maka and Tsubaki were trying with all their might to cheer Crona, the boy's wrecked mind conjuring the images of Kid, dead, killed by someone who was like him in his insane state. They were all waiting Kid to come home. Kid stayed silent for a whole month, in which they all thought the worst had happened.

Then he came back.

All the joy felt by his friends had blinded them from registering what Stein said a few seconds later, in the Death Room when they had been called. But Crona heard loud and clear and went from genuinely happy to on the verge of tears as horror settled on his expression.

"K-Kid is in the i-infirmary?" he shrieked before running out of the room at the speed of light, leaving a trail of smoke, bewildered meisters and weapons and a startled silence behind.

The others had quickly recovered from their shock and followed suit, wanting to see if the young reaper was alright. The light shone bright in the morning as they arrived and smashed the door open (a gift from BlackStar), their eyes complete with worry. The group circled around Kid; Crona, Maka and BlackStar at his left, everyone else at his right. He was wearing a white, dirt-filled blouse, the blanket of the bed covering the rest of his body from the waist, his black and white stripped hair tousled all over and glistening with old sweat and grease due to lack of shower and his face full of cuts here and there. His expression is worn out, tired, as if he can't think straight anymore but he is still glaring at BlackStar, who is grinning like an idiot.

"You didn't need to destroy the door, you know." He said in a sarcastic voice, a hint of fatigue in it.

"Who cares about a stupid door?!" hisses Liz, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him, "You're back! You didn't send us a message of any sort for a whole month Kid! What happened?! Where are you hurt?!" she glares at him, anger and worry seeping in her eyes, making everyone back away slightly. Kid doesn't react the same way.

"The wound on my back and leg is healing rapidly, don't worry about it. And the… circumstances couldn't permit me to communicate with any of you, not even Father." he answers quietly, not daring to look at anyone, his expression stoic.

"Kid, you…!" starts Liz but Tsubaki interrupts her.

"How did you get hurt? And what were those 'circumstances'?" she asks gently, her kind expression hiding the guilty curiosity she is feeling.

He doesn't answer anything for a while, his gaze everywhere but on his friends and his body, stiff. He grips tightly on the white fabric of the blanket, memories making its way toward his mind. He thinks of things, the terrifying and morbid things he saw at Brennenburg castle, of the white-haired Alexander, whom he killed (for the second time since Daniel got himself killed trying but failing, at his mercy even in death, until Kid arrived that is) and took his soul, of the torture dungeons where he found untold horrors, of monsters, of the only guide he trusted, Daniel, a ghost with a strange confusing past, of odd Agrippa…

"You know the drill," he replies in a murmur, his gaze unfocused, "surprise attack from Kishin eggs, dark magic enabling anyone to communicate with the outside world…"

"There were more Kishin eggs?!" exclaims Maka, emerald green eyes pushing him more for answers, "How come? I thought Lord Death send you for only one! How were they? How did they attack you? And what do you mean by 'dark magic', there was a witch too?!"

"So did I." he said, still looking at his friends.

Kid flinched. No. Not a witch, worse than that. A being from another world, already dead, allied with the Shadow, the Orb.

"Tell us how the mission went for you, Kid!" demands Liz in her commanding tone of hers. It could have worked on him before. But again, that was before.

"Yeah, we want to know all the details from that 'dangerous mission' of yours." says Soul, arms crossed and narrowed eyes on Kid. Said boy does not want to respond to any question but he just couldn't tell them to leave him alone, that would just worry them more and push further. He didn't want them to know what he saw and did.

"Kid?"

He gives in a little yelp – by what he can hear BlackStar snort a laugh at him – as he is brought back to the real world by a light touch of a hand on his shoulder. He turns his head around to see black, sad, broken eyes stare back at his own. Not a Grunt, just Crona, not a monster that has no mouth that he can't kill, just and only Crona.

"Y-yes?" he manages to squeak, his heart pounding hard against his chest, restraining himself from whimpering away.

"Y-you don't have to t-tell us you know, i-if you don't want t-to." he tells the young shinigami, his gaze now evading Kid's.

Crona had immediately recognized the look that had passed on Kid's face, his eyes focusing on nothing, the slight tremble of his arms as he clenched harder on the blanket as he lay helplessly on the sick bed, the flash of sheer terror that had passed on his face for a fraction of a second. Maka and Crona share a glance, both knowing because the scythe technician had to get used to the swordsman broken mind and that Kid's seem as broken. Maka immediately feels guilty to have asked him those questions; they could have reminded him of something he didn't want to think about.

From whatever Kid saw, – and the state in which his soul is, as Maka can see – they both know that because of it, his soul has been too traumatized and scarred for life.

"Of course he has to tell us! We need to know how he got in this state and what took him so long to come back! Don't _you _want to know since you were so paranoid these last weeks?!" snarls Liz, her mouth set and her blue eyes glaring.

"No." replies Crona, mildly irritated at the pistol's attitude and her none-understanding of Kid needing time before answering any of their questions without feeling the need to run away or curl up in a ball and hide.

He can hear BlackStar, Soul and Patty howling at them the way students do when one of them gives a headshot reply to a teacher. In the corner of his eyes, he sees Kid send him the fading memory of his smile, thanking him.

"I'm fine, really." mumbles Kid, scratching his head in a nervous habit, "Enough about me please. I don't want to set a riot so let's talk about you guys. How are all doing?"

"We were too worried to do anything, really." snaps Liz through gritted teeth, hands on her thighs.

"Not me! I knew you would come back!" yells BlackStar in his usual arrogant tone, oblivious to the fact that he only just annoyed everybody the last few weeks.

"Me too, Kiddo!" Patty is beaming, none affected by the previously tensed mood everyone was in, obviously happy that her meister is back.

And on they went, subtlety changing the subject of the conversation away from Kid, to his relief, though he knew that neither Liz nor Maka would let him go that easily. His leg throbs where the strange invisible creature in the water had sank its teeth in, drawing blood all over the muddy liquid. At least it didn't hurt as much anymore, merely the same with his back but the only difference being that it wasn't the same monster that lashed at him. Images of jawless beasts, its blank milky dead eyes drawn at him, different previously decapitated body parts gruesomely stitched together, leather belts and ropes holding it all in a loose way, chasing him down with its inches long clawed hand, trying to slash at him as he kept shooting, making no effect whatsoever on the thing, being already dead. He closed his eyes and shook the thought out of his head, wanting to forget all of it for once and do as if nothing ever happened. He notices Crona's warm gaze. At least someone gets what he is feeling.

Everyone chatted along, relating Kid any story that had happened this past month, anything that could take his mind off his worries, fears and stress. He didn't talk much, Maka noticed quickly, as he just nodded, sending sometimes what looks like the ghost of his old smile and smirk, his eyes mostly down, his mind a thousand miles away. She also sees that he is thinner than when he left for Prussia and that his skin looks ill-toned. Death the Kid definitely came back changed and not in a good way.

Days trailed off faster to night as autumn came down and leaves changed from their natural green to a mix of yellow, red and orange, creating a beautiful yet slow death for the trees as they prepare for winter. Kid was soon released, or he daren't show anybody the new scars he had on his back and leg, rather try to think too much of their meaning and the remembrances they bring. He found himself more and more time with Maka and Crona, finding comfort and feeling like nobody except them could ever understand even a little the traumatism he is now living, turning his life upside down as everyone starts seeing.

Anyone who knows Kid well enough would remark the dramatic changes in his habitudes. For example, he pays less attention to symmetry and more on whether it is too dark to walk alone on the streets without a lantern or not, which he now carries almost everywhere with him. He nearly had a heart attack when it disappear (weirdly coinciding with the hast leaving of Soul and BlackStar from the park they were in) at the moment where darkness was joining the evening, if it weren't for Miss Marie being there and accompanying him back home, he would have had a fit similar to the ones he had with symmetry. Also, he can be more easily scared now, as even a pebble thrown across an empty hall could make him jump, yelp or shudder in fear, his feet always picking up the pace after.

The Thompson noticed lately, just after he had been released from the infirmary, that Kid is now unable to sleep in the dark, the lantern and only the lantern always lit on his nightstand next to him. They wondered where he found the lantern and why it seem so important to him, to the point of always bringing it with him. The sisters also noted that he often makes nightmares that have nothing to do with asymmetry, awoken in the middle of the night by them, the boy mostly screaming at a certain Alexander or telling to a certain Agrippa to shut up or mumbling about an Orb, as they recounted them to the others. Liz and Patty interrogated him about it, but he hadn't spoken a word about their contents, saying a bit harshly to mind their own business, to their frustration. Maka keeps assuring the girls that he will come around someday, that he just needed time and support. And it's true; he can't even go to the underground floor of the school, too afraid – though not showing it – to go down alone and without light. Maka always has to accompany him now, if he wants to go see Crona in his cell.

If anyone, the sisters, BlackStar, Soul, Tsubaki, Kim or any living being of the city asks him about the recent changes in his habits, he simply shrugs it off, pretending to not know what they are talking about and leave it be. Sometimes, he would even ignore the question and talk about something completely different, wanting to keep up the appearances of which he is totally fine and normal, and even Maka and Crona don't know what actually happened at Brennenburg castle, rather leaving him space, respect his privacy and patiently wait for him to speak up. But everyone knows that it is only a matter of time before he lets his guard down and completely breaks, like the porcelain shards of a broken china cup spread across the floor.

Then one day, he completely… snapped.

It wasn't a normal class today. The students kept talking about it to each other as the rumor spread out that Stein will force them to face their worst fears, their anticipation as to what could the always cheerful BlackStar could be afraid of or to what changed Kid so drastically as they might found out. Said boy didn't want that day to come. Ever. But sadly it came and not with his excitement, more like his terror to relive the worst moments of his life, the most terrifying ones. All that time, he did everything he could to find a certain normalcy in his life again, trying to regain his symmetry obsession or to fight the spiked-haired ninja at every opportunity he was asked to. He even bought himself a diary, where he confided every emotion and thought he had, draining his entire mind inside it. And now, to him, it looked like all his efforts, all the support his friends gave him even if he didn't spoke a word aloud about it, would be in vain in this dreadful day.

Death the Kid's PoV

I hate the word 'today'. It means that I won't be able to escape my fears and that I will have to face them. Just to think about it churns my stomach upside down.

My friends and I are all settled in our usual seats as Professor Stein appears and falls again from his chair in front of all the class. He quickly gets up before moving to the center of the room glaring at us with his green that are hinted with madness.

"I'm sure you all heard, as I let it slip at one time, that we are going to, that we are going to do something that could as well break your soul or strengthen it." He says, the words capturing our attention, "Facing your fears in a battle is very important, it could determine whether you are going to live or die. Conquering them, even more as it could help you move on past events." The glare of his glass comes to settle on Crona and me, for what I'm sure is a way of telling us that we are the ones that needs to move on. Easier said than done.

"So," he continues, still gazing at the two of us, "I created a liquid that, injected in your veins, would tug a part of your brain to create a hallucination of your biggest fears. You won't be able to see us anymore; the simulation will be so real that it will take over all your senses. Your task will be to force yourself to at least face your fears and be able to calm down enough to pass on to next one."

He takes out a box from under his desk and opens it, revealing ranges of syringes filled with a transparent liquid and points at the computer screen next to him, "I programmed this computer so that it receives information of your cardiac rhythm, which should tell if you are calming down or not. I already prepared everything we will need for this experience so let's start, shall we?" At the last sentence, he sends us a devilish, sadistic smile that shoots shivers up and down my spine. I repress an urge of just getting up and run away.

I feel a small squeeze on my hand and turn myself to look at Crona, to whom dread is falling upon his face. No, I can't escape and leave him alone like to his fate; I wouldn't forgive myself to act so selfishly. I squeeze back, the feeling of his warm hand and slender fingers on mine reassuring.

Stein starts in alphabetical order, beginning with Maka Albarn. I always thought her of one of the bravest persons I've ever met but it looks like even the bravest can succumb to fear when I see her on the dentist-like chair in front of everybody, white as a sheet and shaking violently as the simulation makes its way toward her brain, her arms waggling in every direction, as if pushing something only she can see away from her. In the meantime, Soul's expression is unreadable, all the while Crona clinging to my arm and asking me to tell him when it was over. It lasted 15 minutes. Not promising at all.

I become a little more intrigued when Stein calls BlackStar, who yells above our ears that he will be the bravest of all class, earning more than a few groans and eyes rolling. That's the thing, he's always like that, always bragging about his awesomeness so I'm curious as to what he could have like fear, if he even has one. As I watch, I take point of how BlackStar's grip on the metal handle of the chair tightens, how his jaw clenches as we hear in the silence of the class his shuddering breaths and how his eyes widen, terror residing in them. He gasps and one of his hands comes to grasp the cloth of his black sleeveless shirt, as if stabbed in the chest. His eyes snaps shut, taking deep breaths and he seems to relax a little, and so does Tsubaki, not bothering to hide her worry, sitting on the edge of her seat with Liz and Patty trying to sooth her. It takes only 10 minutes. I can almost hear the rumor of BlackStar actually afraid of something forming in everybody's mind as he sits up and takes shaky pants before wobbling his way back to Tsubaki. This isn't good, I don't want to be here, I don't want to do this!

As Crona makes his way toward his fears under Maka's frantic protests and comes back on the verge of tears after 15 minutes too, my mind becomes hysteric. What is this serum going to show me? Asymmetry? Death? A killer? Grunts? A murder? Alexander? All I know is that it won't do me any good, my mind is already half-destroyed, I don't need this, I don't need to worsen my deteriorating mind problem. Why? Kim is inserted with the serum. Why? Why? _Why?! _Why won't everybody leave me alone? I have a right to keep those secrets to myself, no one needs to know the morbid things I saw or the horror I did that I will forever regret and never forget. I am to be put to shame and dishonored by my father because of that but I'm too afraid to even admit what I did to anyone, too afraid that they will start to hate me and wonder why they were even friends with me in the beginning. This isn't like Crona; this is different because I hadn't felt the jolt of a single emotion to what I did, nor crazy mad pleasure or horror, just cold-blood, just indifference and survival instinct. I'm a coward, a murderous coward! Kim comes back, her head down and unable to look at anyone. Ox runs over her and puts his arm around her; she pushes it away but not him.

"Death the Kid."

I bite my tongue to supress a squeak, tasting blood in it, and my hands quivering and icy though my palms sweating. I push myself off my seat when all I want is to hide thousands of feet underground and never be found. Liz and Patty give me a look of compassion and the younger of the two come and smack my back, telling that I'm going to be the bravest. Doubtful. They are like sisters to me, best friends who support and give me space when I need it and I gratefully thank them for that, even if I feel like filth that doesn't deserve any of it.

I walk slowly toward Stein, the serum and the chair when all I want is to run out of class or even out of school, anywhere that isn't near that serum. I'm walking toward my doom.

I sit and lay silently on the chair, my composure looking calm and collected while mentally, I'm screaming and begging for any savior to come and take my place. I wait as Stein cleanses my neck with antiseptic and presses the plunger that sends the needle and its content inside it. I feel a weigh on my whole body and let out a tiny cry as the world surrounding me goes black.

I am curled up in a ball, trembling and silently cursing myself behind hundreds of rows of shelves in a dark, nearly pitch-black room carved in rough stone. The air around me is humid and cold and the more it did when I get further down under the castle. A lantern is sitting beside me, unlit and I draw a shaky breath before taking a small peek at the door, standing over 15 feet away from me. It stands there unmoving, rotting with mold here and there and inviting me to open it, to see the secrets it can reveal me. But I know better.

And I am proved to be right when it suddenly trembles and shook, scraping noises coming from it, something at the other side clawing its way inside. I quickly back away, further and further into the darkness as wooden splinters fly away, the cracking sound of the door, breaking, ringing in my ears. My heart is beating so hard against my chest that I feel like _it _can hear it, and _it _enters the room, its silhouette slowly breaking from the light and approaching me.

I grab tightly my twin guns and wish that those guns were alive. I would not feel so lonely and scared if Liz and Patty were here and we'd be able to perform a Soul Resonance. We're supposed to be team, but my father said it was dangerous and now I understand more why. I'm sure even Death Cannon wouldn't have worked on the monster but I could still hope even if it won't happen. Another of mentioned creature enters the room, and another. With perfect synchronisation, 8 grotesque heads turn directly in my direction.

No.

They almost clumsily toward me, monstrous growls emanating from their jawless mouth, putrid flesh instead of it, hang limply until their long decaying stomachs. They advance at me, claws ready at the place of hands as I try to scramble away from them, my golden eyes wide with fright and terror. My back hits a wall and there are shelves at each side of me.

_No._

There is no escape. I position the guns and click on the trigger, shooting them. They seem unfazed by it, still marching their path to me, only slower because of the shots but still moving. Their reeking, gruesome odor getting stronger as I whimper, knowing that it's over, I can't break free from here, I will die.

_You won't!_

One of them is standing in front of me. I shut my eyes, my blood frozen, my entire body paralyzed. Its claws slice through my skin, flesh and bone and red crimson liquid splutter my already dirty clothes, which are just black pants torn apart at the edges and my white buttoned blouse now stained by red. I don't hear myself scream as pain from my left shoulder explodes and sinks me in as tears rim the edge of my eyes that I refuse to spill. I land on my back, just in time to see another ugly blank face lash itself on me. Another rain of blood, this time from my chest. I scream, moaning through gritted teeth, but I'm shut away by a slash on my neck. Blood boils from my throat and sails in the air, red drops that splotch my face. I can't breathe. I can't breathe, I can't breathe, I can't breathe! The red liquid blocks the air from entering my lungs, I need, I need it! My mind is blank, the only thing mattering is to not die, to search air, oxygen, I can't think straight anymore, I'm panicking. I squirm and try to evade each attack, tears finally bolting free and flooding on my cheeks. I don't want to die, the worst being in such asymmetrical place and by such asymmetrical creatures!

_HEELLPP MEEEE!_

"Poor boy, you really thought you could kill me, could you?"

It is a cold, evil voice I know too well and thought was dead for good. I suddenly feel the power of the Shadow as Alexander appears hovering in the air, his dead eyes bearing into my living ones. Webs of corrosive flesh materialize itself over the door and walls, killing the last hints of hope I had left of fleeing this place. Why me? Tears still drizzling my bleeding face, I try to crawl away, coughing up blood when pain shoots out from my shoulder and chest and I try in vain to scream it all out, but another slicing enables me from even moving. I look and nearly throw up when I see all my skin peeled off from the wound, blood pouring from it and a broken bone at an unnatural angle in my line of vision. I look away out of pure revulsion and scream even louder. I choke on my blood, my lungs demanding air. Please help me…

"But look who is dying instead." Alexander says before darkly chuckling, "Oh, the irony. The one who tried to kill but is being killed. Your vitae will greatly serve." I can't think anymore, just feel.

_It's painful, it hurts, it's painful, it hurts, it's painful, it hurts, it's painful, it hurts,_ _it's painful, it hurts, it's painful, it hurts, it's painful, it hurts, it's painful, it hurts…_

_Just accept your death, you did all you could. It's not your fault all of this happened, yes?_

I shut my eyes, still sobbing and try to calm myself down. I can't die peacefully here, I can't accept my death. My dying heart slows down.

Calm.

Heart.

_None of this is real! Kid, this is a simulation!_

It feels too real. Why should I believe any of what my delirious mind is telling me to think? My vision blurs.

_It's the serum! Remember, the serum can take over all your senses! That's why it feels real but it isn't! Come back, Kid, please!_

Again, I'm going out of my mind to find any way of believing there is an escape when there isn't.

_There is! You're supposed to calm your cardiac rhythm, you're supposed to calm down, then you'll be able to pass on the next fear, you'll escape this!_

This can't be true, can it? All of this is in my mind, is it? Another slash on legs and I'm soaked with blood, though still not dying.

_IT'S TRUE, DAMNIT! BRING YOUR BUT OUR OF HERE OR CRONA AND I WIL MAKA CHOP YOUR HEAD OUT! FACE YOUR GODDAMN FEAR!_

Crona? Maka Chop? Maka? My eyes widen again as my soul brings up all the memories of my life and what happened not long ago. Images of Stein, the syringe and the fear serum are brought back to me. But how can I conquer this fear of mine that all this can't happen again to me, anywhere, anytime? That these monsters can't exist elsewhere, or ant doppelgänger of Alexander or poor Daniel, who was brought along with me on my journey at Brennenburg? How can I conquer this fear of mine, knowing that Orbs already existed before and that there might be one somewhere around the world? How? I'm too scared, too frightened, too much of a coward for that! Too disgusting!

_Kid, you don't have to conquer it, just face it. Facing it under the pressure of this feeling is already an accomplishment. Please come back…_

These voices…

Huh?

Within my train-wrecked mind and soul, through the unreal pain my body is feeling, I imagine myself as a ghost, like Daniel, putting all my will in it.

It's _my_ fear. And only _I _can allow it to scare me.

It stopped. The pain stopped. The bleeding stopped. I look at my body, not a single wound on it, though the blood that spilled is still on my clothes. I can control my fear? I can control the simulation?

Rage boils within me and I spun around to look at the fake Alexander straight in the eye. I hurl myself toward him.

"Bastard." I say before swiftly cutting him perfectly in half with a black blade I summoned on my arm with my soul. Just for the sake of symmetry, I summoned another on my other arm, and slashed him a second time with it.

The landscape changes all of the sudden and I tumble downward in the darkness as I inhale and exhale, sweet, beautiful oxygen filling my lungs to the maximum and invigorating my body in its entirety.

I land gently on a white-lit floor, a lamp over me swinging softly, complete darkness outside the light. A wooden table, well carved, is in front of me, a tied, half-naked man in front of me. A strange blue painted 'S' is on the man's torso as he tries but fails to free himself from his bounds. The scenery around me changes and takes the shape and form of a 19 century office, the man in the middle of it.

I know that to open the door on my left, I have to get the key for it. Only problem is that I have to find the key since its nowhere to be seen. A note at the man's feet lets me know that the key… is_ inside _the man's stomach. A reminiscence of my past action comes back with a burning smack to me. I feel instant remorse and guilt, disgusted at myself to have done what I did and with such apathy. A knife stands next to him, waiting to be used. My chest hurts, because I can't support the fact that I actually went searching the key in the man's stomach, feeling all its organs on my fingers, intestines, everything. I fall on my knees, not able to look at the table in front of me as voices starts whispering around me, harsh and full of hatred toward me.

"He did this? Disgusting…..And he calls himself shinigami, that's doubtful!... Murderer!... He shouldn't even live… He's a monster… I don't think he is even human… He should be put in an asylum….. Kill him!...You're hideous, insane!...Is he a Kishin?... Why is he still alive?...Killer!... That _thing _had actually been in our school…. We should make him suffer as he made that man suffer, just for symmetry….. We'll kill you, I swear it…" they go on and on, tormenting me with their insults.

"Stop, please… I'm sorry…" I murmur, barely audible to myself.

"_Liar!"_ they all whisper at me, "Who'd believe a single word of what you say?... You're just garbage, no one believes you….. Why would we trust a killer?... Disgusting! Don't even try to lie to us!...Killing someone, then _lying?_ Pathetic… Don't even try to cry, we have no pity for you… Insolent scum of a liar!..." they incarnate the voices of my friends, people that I know, that I know will hate me if I tell them that I killed a man with cold-blood.

"I regret it so much; I can't even do a dissection without wanting to throw up so much I feel guilty! I hate myself, I hate myself! I feel horrible, filthy, and hideous and I feel like I dying every day!" I cry, my hands grabbing and yanking my hair, the weight of guiltiness crushing me.

"You deserve it!" they all whisper-yell at me.

"It can't be completely my fault!" I moan, my arms hugging my knees, "I would have died if it weren't for that key but, but…. It was all mostly _his _ fault! _Alexander's fault! _If it weren't for him, I wouldn't have done that, I wouldn't even been there at the first place! _He's _the murderer, the killer! He forces everyone that comes to his path to do his bidding, to torture, to kill! It is _his _fault!"

A silhouette appears in front of me, marching slowly toward the table. Black jacket, three white buttons on the chest and around the shoulders, black pants, black shoes, black hair… Three stripes on the left side of it.

_Me._

My clone looks at me, expression completely monotone, like a robot that has been programmed to do something. To kill someone, I realize suddenly. I jump on my feet, but the weight of the guilt pushes me down and the whispers become yells. I feel invisible hands tugging each part of me, pulling me away from the person I have to save, away from the killer. I try to push the hands but I can't feel anything, just air, so I do what I just learned not long ago. I use my mind to produce a sort of shield around me, pushing the invisible bodies away from me as they growl and hiss at me. Then I get up again, bearing all the burden of my culpability and I lunge myself as the clone does the same, both hands reaching for the knife. I grab the table pushing it toward me, letting the other Kid fall on the ground when he fails to catch it. I seize the weapon, staring at it, before hastily backing away from the man, like he could force me to kill him. The other me gets up, glaring at me with the same alluring golden eyes as mine.

"Well," he says slowly, his voice also deprived of emotion, "what are you waiting for? Kill him. You need the key."

_Don't! This is not you, Kid! You're not a killer!_

The same voices than before…

I purse my lips, my eyes down on the knife. I won't give it to him that is sure. But what do I do with it? I don't want to do the same mistake, I won't – not even in a thousand years, kill that man.

So I won't use it for that. Not this time.

I twirl the blade, positioning it in front of my chest, and then I think of my body as hard as diamond.

"I'd rather die than kill innocent lives again." I whisper before pushing the blade against my own stomach. All the voices in my head scream.

As I thought, it broke in millions of pieces and the landscape changes again, back to reality.

I give in a loud screech before sitting up straight and knock hard my head with Crona and Maka's, who both groan while rubbing it. I feel their souls resonating with mine and it hits me that those voices in my head – not the harsh ones, the ones that told me all of this was a simulation – were theirs. My heart is beating a thousand miles per second and I feel like I might explode. Feel a sudden nausea at the memory of my bones cracking, my skin splitting open and all the blood and tears throughout Alexander's torture. And my cold-blooded murder.

Without warning, I push the two away and run out of class, under the pressure of every pair of eyes in it, a hand clamping my mouth from spilling everything up, my vision stretching and blurring, worsening my sickness. I hear Maka and Crona's footstep behind me as I run toward the boy's bathroom. I barely make it to the cabinet and the cuve that I drop to my knees and retch everything I ate earlier, trembling. I feel a hand gently drape itself around my waist as heave after heave, my mouth tastes even more awful from the vomit I cough up. When I have nothing left to reject, I turn a bit to see Crona next to me and Maka waiting outside the cabinet, her fiery green eyes on myself.

"Em-embarras-sing, isn't i-it?" I stutter when I lay on the refreshing cold tile floor.

"No, it isn't. I would have reacted the same way." She answers gently and she crouches next to me, "Do you want to take some air outside?"

I nod silently without looking at them, feeling sick after they just saw me in this state. I tremulously push myself up before unsteadily walking over the sink and erase the taste of puke from my mouth with water. I take a look at myself at the mirror.

I look crazy. My hair is all messed up, so messed up that the three Sanzu lines on it don't even appear straight anymore. My usually tidy black jacket is completely crumpled up, unbuttoned at certain regions and one the sleeves is half rolled-up, the showing skin slightly bruised in the shape of a hand, as if someone had a strong hold on it, like to keep me down. My auburn golden eyes and black hair are more striking now that I'm white as snow.

I look ill. I look deranged.

I dart my eyes away from the mirror and silently follow my two friends outside the school ground, my black and white locks of hair hiding my face with my bowed head. We descend the staircase and stop walking at half of it, just enough for me to still have a nice view of the city. We sit on the stairs, Maka at my right and Crona at my left and I propel my chin on my knees while looking at Maka.

"I look completely mad. What happened during the simulation?" I ask her, bringing back my gaze on my shoes. I feel revolting.

"Well…" she starts.

Maka's PoV

"Well…" I start, shivering a bit at the mere thought of what happened when the serum took over Kid. I'm still shaken by my own experience, which I would rather not think about. I suspect that Kid acted like he did because he had bottled up every emotion he had inside of him, shutting everyone out from him and now that he couldn't contain it anymore he just… exploded. This makes me want to help him even more, make him happy again, but first, I need to understand and explain.

"It was fine at first, for a few minutes, you looked only a bit afraid but almost not. We all thought that you were going to make it quickly…. Then everything seemed to get downhill for you, your eyes had grown wide and you started shaking. You looked like you were trying to get away from something and you curled into a ball, shaking back and forth. Without warning, you stopped and started to scream. That was after 10 minutes and you screamed very loudly, grabbing your left shoulder as if it was hurting, or something. You waved your legs everywhere and fell off the chair, backing away from everyone doing so. Stein didn't say anything, he was noting stuff and we were very worried for you but we didn't know what to do!

You kept screaming and you were now grabbing your chest. You shouted to stop, to stop hurting you, that it's _his_ fault you did what you did, that _he's_ the murderer. You screamed that because of _him_, a certain Daniel was dead." My voice is trembling with inner rage. I can almost _feel_ what Kid felt in the simulation, I even watched it. I hate the person who made Kid go through hell; I hate that Alexander so much.

"At some point, after a full 25 minutes, I couldn't take it anymore, seeing you cry and suffer. So, I went over to you and Crona followed me. I argued with Stein, he was saying that you had to calm yourself alone but heck! I didn't give a damn about what he said! I just wanted to get you out of there. Crona was a genuine genius by reminding me that we can try Resonance Link with you and that's what we did. We saw what you were going through, Alexander and those monsters, the man, your clone, those other voices. Since our mind were meddling with yours, we saw bits and bribes of memories that came to you during the simulation and let me tell you, I'm not _ever_ letting anyone make you go through that again or call you killer and disgusting because you're not! You'll forever be my friend and I don't intend to ever abandon you or hate you! And you know, those voices you heard, it was us! At the beginning, we thought you had to die to pass on but instantly, we both felt stupid for even mentioning the idea, so we screamed in your mind, trying to make you aware that none of what you were seeing was real. And it worked! You made it to get out of there! You passed on to the next fear and did the same thing then came back to reality but…"

I trail off, biting down my lip, guilty about what I'm about to ask.

"But you want to know the full story behind this don't you? All of you want it; you just need to look at the number of students who ask me the same goddamn question per day." He finishes, his voice cold and sarcastic and glaring at me.

I get up, put my hands on my hips and stand in front of him, my own glare targeting him. Did he think I wanted the full story just for curiosity and to spread rumors about him? I can't believe him!

"Kid!" I shout, outraged, "You can't just shut us out forever! None of us – and by that, I mean our friends, wants you to be alone with that burden on your shoulder! But if you want help, if you want to feel better, you need to let us in!"

"And what if I don't want any of your help?! Has it occurred to any of you that maybe I _can_ do this well on my own? I don't need pitying looks from everybody! I'm completely fine alone because no one needs to see what I saw!" replies Kid, standing up too but still looking clammy.

"It hasn't occurred to any of us because we both know damn well that it's impossible!" yells Crona, to my astonishment. He grabs Kid's shoulder and forces the young Reaper to look at him, "Nobody, and I know what I'm talking about from ex-experience, can escape this fo-forever. That kind of burden is impossible to bear alone because you'd turn insane from all the fear, a-anger, sadness and guilt. Whether you like it or not, y-you'll have to deal with this, one way or another, b-but not alone." All the while Crona talked – to my pride, Kid's eyes had become wider and wider until the gold of his irises nearly takes over all the white. They are gleaming.

He suddenly collapses and starts sobbing helplessly against Crona's shoulder while pulling the boy down back on the stairs. He snuggles himself against the pinket, crying and hiccupping while Crona gently strokes his hair and whispers soft words to him, saying that it's going to be all fine and that we are here to help him all the way and make him happy, something I usually did when said swordsman has a mental breakdown, which makes me proud of him. In my life, I have never seen Kid so vulnerable, so broken and sad – _truly_ sad, not just because of symmetry – and it makes me tearful. I never want to see him like this again, never sad again. I sit back next to the boys, rubbing Kid's back while shushing and talking to him too.

"Y-y-you ca-an't get w-what it fe-eels like t-to li-ive som-somethi-ing l-like th-at b-because-se y-you never l-l-lived i-it." He sniffles through his sobs, and when he cries, it's hardcore, lots of loud wails, hiccups and nose flooding with liquid.

Crona takes out a box of tissues out of nowhere and hands it to him, who looks confused through his tears.

"Y-you snot a lot." Crona simply says, like it could explain the origin of the Universe. He takes out a tissue and wipes his friend's nose, who squirms a little and whose cheeks turn a bright red.

"I-I don-on't s-snot!" he manages to say.

"You do. A lot. It's like a river in your nose. So shut it and let Crona wipe it all off 'cause it's cute." I can't help but giggle a little when both of them start blushing wildly.

"I-I've l-lived wo-orse." Kid hides his head by nuzzling it in Crona's neck. My laughter is instantly gone, replaced by guilt.

For a while, none of us say anything, lost in our own thoughts. I simply rub Kid's back while Crona brushes his fingers on his jet-black hair, hugging him at the same time. My mind is racing, trying to find any ways that could possibly help Kid move on and feel more happy than he was these last weeks but I need for that to better comprehend his fears and understand them but I also need to know happened in Prussia to make him so paranoid and afraid which is so unlike him that even BlackStar started to notice his strange new habits. I need the whole story.

Eventually, his sobs quieten and reduce themselves to small hiccups. I look at him and when I do, he simply looks numb, insensible to everything and I feel horribly bad for my desire for answers as to what happened.

"Kid…" I say but he interrupts me.

"Not here, not now." he whispers, "At Gallows Manor, when the three of us are alone which is most probably at night since everybody will be asleep. So come have a sleepover tomorrow with me, today the sisters will be too worried to even sleep, I'm sure of it and they'll keep coming to check on me. Everything will be explained then." he lays his head down on Crona's shoulder again and not even a minute later, he's deeply asleep. I don't blame him; Liz told me that he was having insomnia lately.

"He seems so peaceful…" says Crona, gazing at the boy with so much tenderness in his eyes I feel like I just found him on the act of kissing.

"Yeah, he does." I say, looking at Kid.

For ounce, his eyebrows are unknotted, relaxed and his eyes looks bigger than they are, even closed. His mouth is slightly open and it seems like all his worries had vanished, leaving an almost happy teenager boy at its place. And with his body curled up like a kitten against Crona's, he just looks downright adorable.

"Will you come tomorrow, Crona?" I ask Crona, smiling a little.

"Y-yeah, b-but I feel like w-we should keep all of wh-at Kid tells u-us a secret…" he answers quietly, anxious at my reply.

"Of course, I will. Don't worry about it Crona." I pat his shoulder comfortingly.

It's almost two in the morning and the stars are shining brightly outside from the lack of light pollution, the moon hidden, the only light next to a candle lit inside a lantern on a nightstand.

The three of us are sit in a tiny circle on Kid's large bed, in his room, the lighten lantern giving it an almost sinister aspect in the darkness. It casts ghostly shadows over the symmetrical dark paintings, sumptuously carved wardrobes and wooden cupboards, its eerie glow giving us uncanny expressions, reflected over the mirrors on each side of the walls, contemptuous and almost murderous ones. To add more to the ominous features of the bedroom, the air is freezing cold, making me glad to cover myself with the warm and thick blankets. I'm sure that if someone was observing us at this moment, everything would like we are in hiding in this possibly haunted house, waiting in the still silence for something dreadful to happen. And we are waiting for something to happen.

Kid bites his lip and gulps, "Are you sure?" he asks. We both nod.

Kid, Crona and I close our eyes. We all agreed that to spare Kid from thinking too much about what he saw, we should do what we did during the simulation, A Resonance Link. So I concentrate on the invisible surroundings around me, keeping the material world out of my mind, only focusing on the brilliant souls in front of me. I welcome them, brushing my own soul against them, inviting them to connect theirs to mine in which they do. A single, unique blue glow radiates from us, engulfing the room and swallowing the darkness, a little to my deception since the whole aspect could have come out of a horror book and I love horror books. I feel Kid and Crona's soul united with mine, their every emotion I ask to see through Kid's mind and we fall into a mental landscape.

The three of us are standing in a marble black and white floor, a multitude of shining in and out multi-colored crystals, spiked and twisted in every way and are of every height on the ground while everything else, the non-existent ceiling and walls are immerged in pure blackness. It's beautiful and I mesmerize over it. Fog immerses itself in everywhere. When I went into Crona's mind during the Black-Blood battle to stop the revival of the Kishin, I was shrinking to the point of being a small child, representing the state of mind Crona was and still is: a child learning to discover the world around him. With Kid, I am still myself, at the same age but I'm wearing a long black cloak, covering all my body with a hood hiding my face, revealing only my now flashing orange eyes, the color of my soul. Crona is next to me, in the same outfit and wearing now black-violet eyes, which finishes the quite mystic look on him and reinforces the confusion on whether he is actually a 'she' or not. Kid is nowhere to be seen.

"Kid?" I call out, my voice echoing loudly around me, repeating itself until it fades away in the black abyss of the sky, "Where are you?!"

"Here…" comes in the quiet voice of my three-stripped friend, near a bright blue crystal. Crona and I look at each other before following the voice, meeting its owner sit and gazing at nowhere in particular.

Kid looks at us, his eyes wide and alert suddenly, like he just woke up. "O-oh, I didn't hear any of you coming, you're quiet." He looks over himself and then at his other side, clearly searching something.

He seems to have found it and gets abruptly up, brushing his cloak of invisible dust and walking away from us. "It's here, the memories of Brennenburg. There they are." He points at a cluster of obscure, large stones dim of any light at all, something deeply evil and frightful coming from it that I'm sure I would be able to sense even miles away. I can see glimpses of an image or two being mirrored on them but they are blurred, Kid pushing them away from his soul.

"D-do we have to t-touch t-them?" nervously asks Crona. Kid gazes at him with his bright scarlet ringed eyes and another crystal behind us shines brightly, brighter than the others.

I turn around myself to see a clear reflected memory on a pale blue gemstone, Crona hugging a pillow on his bed and telling something at what Kid laughs joyfully, the swordsman soon joining him but only in small shy giggles, me next to him and laughing too. I know by instinct that the memory is from before Kid went to Prussia. He looks so different now…

I bring my gaze back to Kid and the stones, feeling like I'm intruding and seeing something that isn't my business.

"Yeah, you have too, but you will be able come back at any time after getting sucked in it." He answers gently before doing something that majorly surprises me.

He walks over the lavender-haired boy and tip-toes himself, lifting his head to the taller boy in front of him and leaning in closer and closer to the boy's face with nearly closed eyes, his lips slightly parted. At millimetres from closing up the space between himself and Crona, he stops, a complete statue before quickly backing away, his cheeks and nose as red as his eyes. I was so sure Kid was going to kiss him! I wonder, what the hell took him to stop?! And how did he manage to keep his feelings at bay, I do not know and I immediately want to ask him his advices to stop myself from blushing in front of Soul. But there are things more important to do.

"Crona." I coo at him, nodding at him in a determining way. I grab his hand and entwine my fingers to his, bringing them against the icy-cold stone. I stand frozen cold as my eyes are plunged in a wave of sensations, emotions and remembrances. We both gasp at the sheer horror.

I see myself as Kid, standing in front of the entrance of a grandiose castle, marveling at its symmetry and excited to better see it from the inside after he finishes his mission. Little did he know about what was upcoming to him.

I see myself chasing a strange ghost, trying to catch up to him to ask him questions about the place. His name is Daniel. He doesn't recall his last name. Or his past. Daniel explains to me what he saw here and how he died and for what he died, his purpose. I'm angry at the disgusting secrets that lay upon such spectacular building.

"My mission here is exactly what your objective was in your lifetime. I was sent here to kill Alexander." I say in Kid's voice.

I see myself exploring the hidden corridors of the bastion, repulsed by the discoveries or dead, tortured corpses while Daniel behind me shrieks and suddenly makes his confession, that he did all this, forced to do this. At first, I'm angry, screaming at him in my hatred but he interrupts me in a louder voice:

"What would you do to save your life and keep yourself from accidently killing innocent people?! The Orb I had kills anyone that comes in contact of it!"

"Orb? What 'Orb' are you talking about?" I ask, confused. Daniel lets out a long moan before explaining to me the full story, everything he found out about himself along the way, the archeologist he was, Professor Herbert, the accident in Africa, the discovery of the Orb, the deaths it provoked at the slightest contact. His desperate search for help, the letter Alexander sent him, the lies with what he manipulated Daniel, his cold-blooded murders and tortures, the Shadow, his willing amnesia, his sister Hazel, everything.

"It still doesn't excuse your actions." I growl, but more calmly.

"I know. Why do you think I tried to kill him? Redemption, vengeance." He answers and I can hear the true tone of remorse and pain in his voice. I stay silent.

I see myself facing for the first time the horrifying Grunts, my gunshots having not a single effect on those monsters. I start running with Daniel shouting at me where to hide or where there is a risk of others appearing which is practically everywhere.

I see myself hidden inside a closet, trembling in fear while something slowly walks just in front of the doors, growls and snarls imminent from it.

I see myself howling in pain while an invisible creature lurking in the water bites its sharp teeth on my leg and how I narrowly escape it, bleeding. I find a room where I tear a jacket apart and use it as gauze on my wound. I learn from Daniel that these unseen monsters are called Kaernk and are from another world.

I see myself as Kid trying to communicate with us, using every mirror I can find, trying to summon his dad, but failing each time. I scream my rage before kicking a mirror I just used against the wall and letting myself fall on the bed in front of me. I have never felt so lonely and more desperate than now, Daniel away to scout the path I decided to take.

I see myself fighting against Darkness, fighting to keep my sanity in the pitch-black hallway, having nothing left to light up the lantern Daniel found for me. I suddenly hear a snarl just behind me. My eyes widen in fear. I run through the dark hallway, the thing chasing me and nearly surrendering myself to the madness of total darkness.

I see myself stuck in what looks like the most luxurious amphitheatre I have ever seen, everything in precious gems, gold, refined wood and red velvet, a Grunt climbing the stairs toward me as I franticly search the key to the door that will lead me away from here.

"Here!" shouts Daniel from the other side of the auditorium. He points at a chair where even where I am; I see something glinting on it. Problem is, the monster is now blocking the passage. And it's a Brute.

What a strange looking fountain I am staring at. Filthy water gushes from what looks to be a baby's mouth attached to a spine-crafted stone, a woman's legs and thighs also dangling at the edge of the water container. I am feeling Kid's repulsion and curiosity.

"This is truly an odd object we are seeing here." I say, arching a brow up.

"I agree, this fountain always spooked me and I wonder sometimes who had the idea of carving it." says what I consider now to be my ghostly friend.

"That is a good question." I reply, now wondering too.

I see myself sobbing, a bloody key at my bloody hand and a dead man on a table, his chest and stomach open, all organs out.

"_I'm sorrryyyyy! Stupid key, stupid key! Goddamn fucking key!" _I scream, tears pooling on my cheeks and blurring my vision, my head between my knees as I rock myself back and forth, sniffling and hiccupping. I don't care anymore if I die or not, I don't feel like I even deserve to live anymore but one thing is sure, Alexander _is going to pay._

I see myself lying on a bed, Daniel next to me recounting me everything he did when he died, knowing that I needed to hear something else than just stuff about killings. He told me about the villages he explored near the bastion, about going back to England and try to find anything that could bring back bits and bribes of his lost memories, anything to distract me from the murderer and torture I inflicted to that man on the table.

I see myself numbly staring at nets of flesh, Daniel explaining to me that they are the manifestation of the Shadow and that sometimes we can hear screams coming from it and that it can be violent at some moments We aren't very far anymore from our objective, nearly there now.

I see myself meeting Agrippa, Daniel's friend as they both explain to me that his consciousness is trapped inside a dead body to let Alexander have information from him. I am completely disgusted at the baron's ways. He asks me to find ingredients and make a potion of his student, Johann Weyer, for him to set him free from his body and stop Alexander from using the Orbs. I try to find them but, I also start to see the worst, most deranged torture chambers and cells, mangled bodies that were clearly tortured in the most disturbing, inhuman ways.

I see myself cutting Agrippa's head, another thing that scarred Kid's mind as I try with all my will to not puke.

I see myself trying to not shout at Agrippa to shut up, monsters not far from us and his blabbering annoying me and drawing them near. We talk a lot but now is not the time, even telepathically!

I see myself running away from a horde of Grunts and Brutes, Agrippa and Daniel with me, toward the room where resided Alexander and the portal he tried for centuries to open, using my friend for it, as I learned even in death, soul possessing Daniel and desperately trying to extract the most vitae possible. It's going to be soon over.

I see myself looking at the walls and rooms, sluggish substance covering almost everything, the Shadow taking over the whole castle.

I see myself finally fighting Alexander, in the Inner Sanctum, his body appearing and disappearing out of thin air, unleashing poltergeist powers none of us knew he had, moving furniture and every weapon at me without even lifting his finger. The Shadow is about to unleash itself on me and I need to hurry. He even nearly possessed me, painfully, but I pushed him away with all my soul. I have never felt so much power emanating anywhere in the world, except maybe when the Kishin was revived, but this time it comes from the Orb. Agrippa yells at me to throw his head in the portal. I do.

I see myself shoot Alexander one last time and feel relief wash over me as his soul separates from his dead, transparent body and he screams at me, his eyes going wild when he fails to catch his soul and gets sucked with Agrippa in the portal, dying for the second time and forever.

I see Daniel yell at me to get away. I was so distracted by Alexander's final death that I didn't think about the Shadow finally free and suddenly lashing out at my back. I feel a hot pain so burning and horrible at my back that I can't even scream anymore, falling into a sweet unconsciousness, into a growing puddle of my own blood, while I hear a man screaming and begging at me for mercy as I know I stabbed him and killed him.

I see myself fluttering my eyes open, being dragged by Daniel toward one of the villages he told me about, him also telling me that because of Alexander, he discovered that he could move objects with his mind too, using his gift to his advantage to take me out of the castle. I can see that he is at his limit, desperately trying to not let my floating body fall on the ground. People round around me later, bringing me in a hospital to check the wounds on my leg and back. Daniel tells me that he wants to explore the world again, his longing for real freedom. When I go back to Death City, making sure for him to know where I'll be, I tell him to go.

"Just go." I tell him, still in Kid's voice, in the infirmary, "You really deserve it; you saved my life many times and helped me kill Alexander. You helped me escape the Grunts, Brutes and not lose myself in that place. You deserve freedom so go…Then come back here and tell me what you saw because I am dying to know." I smile just a tiny bit at that last sentence and I hear him chuckle a bit too before lending me his lantern and disappearing, promising me to come back once he has a ton of stories to tell me.

I see everything, absolutely, totally everything.

Then I see Crona, myself and the others arrive to Kid.

I take my hand away from the black stone, my mind swirling with dizziness and disconnecting itself from Kid's, the stones and scarlet and violet eyes evaporating to be replaced by my normal view of the world, me laying on the bed and panting. Our souls had disconnected, Crona and Kid in the same position I am, both sweating and heavily breathing.

"Well…?" breaths Kid.

I think, my thoughts swirling with new information. "I understand better now. Actually, I understand everything now and-and…. Will you present me to Daniel? I'd…I'd like to meet him." I catch my breath. The bedroom is dark again, sending me shivers instead of wonder.

I sit up and unexpectedly bring Kid against me, hugging him tightly. I release him from my grip and he stares at me, gazing at me with bewildered eyes.

"I will never, ever let anything like that happen to you again, Kid. Trust me, you are still my friend and I still think of you as a Grim Reaper, a tough and brave one. It was _Alexander _who brought that man up, not you. You were just there at the wrong time and wrong place, that's all, you are not bad, never were and never will. And you killed Alexander, so he will never be able to do anything like that again, do you hear me Kid? _Never._"

He closes his eyes and lets out a small whimper, taking deep breathes.

"M-me too Kid, I understand b-better now." says Crona, still stuttering but looking serious, a premiere for me. I guess I rub myself on him by spending all that time with him.

"W-what happened, happened, you ca-can't undone i-it." He continues, "You just h-have t-to look forward n-now. Re-redempt yourself. And you d-did, Kid. T-the only thing left n-now is to l-live up again, learn from i-it."

His gaze goes from me to Crona, and again, a blush spreading on his face.

"I really thought all of you would hate me to have killed and tortured that man, coldly and just for a key, to be weak to the point of nearly falling into madness and get possessed by Alexander, to have cut without question someone's head or even be a friend to a ghost…I-I…I don't know how to…."

"Deal with this? We can help with that." finishes Crona, patting his shoulder "And I-I too want to m-meet Daniel, he seems n-nice enough, friendly…"

"We'd even go with you and your symmetry obsession!" I whisper-yell, determined to help my friend to the very end, "I'd join you in it, even if Soul and Liz gets annoyed at me, all I want is to make you feel better, happier!"

"Hell yeah!" says Crona, his black eyes burning into life too. I feel so proud of him, to come out of his shell like that and look as determined as he is, the best being to help a friend (or possibly boyfriend). I smile brightly at them.

"Y-you could confide to us a-at any time you wa-ant, when you feel the need to talk and ha-have us reassure you that w-we still want you to hang o-out with us! Wri-writing poems helps t-too!" he continues then it's Crona's turn to hug Kid, who blushes some more. I embrace the two with my arms.

"You can count on us Kid!" I tell him, filled with feels and when I take a peek at my friend's souls, they are filled with emotion too. Without warning, we all burst into a fit of laughter and crying, forcing to make ourselves as quiet as possible.

"Th-thank y-y-you…" he whispers and rapidly wipes his tears away, looking defenceless and vulnerable again which he obviously feels embarrassed about. He pushes himself away from us and blushes again, taking peeks at us.

Death the Kid's PoV

I feel amazingly stupid. I was thinking, all that time, that _Maka Albarn _and _Crona_ would hate me for my murder and weakness. Maybe the others would but not them, never them, Crona killed more people than he ever should have and within his own madness, under Medusa's glare and still survived all of that, bear all his guilt while Maka accepted him and became his first friend, always first to defend him from reluctant students, always first to comfort him when he is having a breakdown. Why would I even _think _that they would hate me? They've lived worse, mostly Crona! I sigh.

At least them would still want to be with a wrecked person like me, even Daniel as a ghost and me as a living person stood next to me all that time in Brennenburg and at the infirmary, even promising me that he will come back, when I thought he would do something like pass on to the afterlife or something like that. Guess not.

These last weeks have been crazy after that 'sleepover', winter arrived, no snow since we are in Nevada but we all now wear coats outside, our boots crunching on the dead leaves. Liz and Patty had forbidden me to take any mission at all for the next month and so did my father, who is excruciatingly worried for me, which I didn't expect either. I don't complain though, mentally feeling too tired to do a mission – BlackStar doesn't complain either, merely yelling that he is better than me and never gets tired.

I get more symmetry obsession fits lately and guess what? Maka and Crona weren't joking when they said they would join me in my fits, they whined with me every time it happened, complaining that the beauty of the painting had been destroyed, that the water in the glass was horrifying since it doesn't measure a symmetrical number or that Maka's pigtails would not be cute until they were perfectly fixed. Honestly, they almost scare me but it's also comforting to have people who know the full story by my side and the only person I will ever find cute and beautiful is Crona, in what I still feel like an idiot to have nearly kissed him that night, mentally and not physically, which makes things even more awkward for me. I make nightmares, a lot but Maka drags me every day to meditate now, so that is what I do when I wake up from those bloody, gory dreams and it helps.

Daniel comes in from time to time but I never know when he comes and goes and I don't try to either, he too has his own hell to deal with and I don't want to try to worsen it, I just let him come and talk to me, show me things from the modern world he found out about and describe what he knows and found related to archeology. Ounce, he was completely absorbed into finding out how an IPod works and had almost looked like a child learning something new and fun, it was a bit weird since he is his thirties'. Maka seems very curious and friendly to him, asking him a lot of questions about his time, when he was alive in the 19 century while Crona discovers too things with him, the two completely mesmerized over the world around them.

I collapse too, I'm just not able to resist sometimes, the feelings of guilt, anger, fear and self-hate clinging to me like a gum to a shoe. When that happens, that's where all Maka and Crona's efforts comes into action, they go and take me somewhere open, full of warm light and deserted of people so that we would talk alone. I let myself go then, sometimes having mood swings and shouting and screaming insults and nonsense in pure anger before the next second, laying on the ground crying the life out of me with Crona and Maka rubbing my back silently, patiently waiting for me to come back. At these moments, I talk a lot and let all my thoughts go out of my mouth, sometimes even wishing to truly die and then Maka would Maka Chop my head, reminding me that I'm not alone even if it hurts my brain afterwards. Liz and Patty noticed but don't try to interfere with it, seeing that I look better and calmer later on.

I don't know what would have happened to me if it weren't for those three (adding Daniel in our little circle). I can just tell that I am forever grateful to them, not completely happy but recovering. Everything will be better with time; I could consider this as my new, not at all perfect, happiness.


End file.
